With advancement in technology, immersive video or 360-degree video is being developed to provide a wholesome viewing experience by enabling a user to view the video in every direction. Immersive videos are created by recording the view of a real-world scene in every direction at the same time.
The user can change or control viewing direction and playback speed during playback of the immersive videos. The user can change or control the viewing direction by moving a device having a gyroscope or infrared sensor that is playing the immersive video. Examples of such devices include, but not limited to, smartphones capable of playing the immersive videos and head-mounted displays. The user can change or control the viewing direction by interacting with video played on a display or projection screen of a computer, notebook, player, and other presentation device such as a head-mounted display.
Various solutions are available for presenting and sharing typical videos, other than immersive videos. In one solution, time-marked hyperlinking to video content is performed. Accordingly, a first user specifies one or more particular instants in the video content other than a beginning of the video on a user interface (UI) rendering the video content. The particular instant may be a particular frame of the video content, a particular point in time with respect to one or more of the beginning of the video content or an end of the video content, or a combination of the two. Upon specifying, the UI generates data representing the one or more particular instants for inclusion in a link to the video content that can be shared via email or chat applications. Automatically or in response to accessing the link, the video content starts playing the first of the one or more particular instants in the video content represented by the data in link. However, this solution is limited to playing videos from a particular user-selected time instant. This solution does not provide any facility to view or share the video at multiple viewing angles.
In another solution, a viewer of a recorded video item is provided with the ability, via a recording medium, to select to watch the video item from different angles and/or heights. The video item is recorded from live events using a plurality of cameras and therefore comprises of a plurality of video tracks recorded on a recording media. The video tracks include data representing views spaced 360° around the video item such that, for example, if there are 8 video tracks available, when the video item is taking place, eight cameras are angularly spaced and located with respect to the item being filmed and directed to said video item. Thus, the viewer can select any of the view and corresponding video track from the recording media being played. In addition, the selection can be performed during viewing via the apparatus used to decode the data from the recording media, for example, a digital versatile disc (DVD) player.
In one another solution, broadcasters have made available multiple channels for single sporting events. Each channel may provide a different viewing angle and/or commentary for viewing the event. A content recorder, which is recording the single sporting event, receives a program view (e.g., a channel) selection. The content recorder then transmits a viewer data request for the currently selected program view to a service provider or broadcaster. The content recorder may then receive requested viewer data of the selected program containing information of the currently selected view and one or more alternate views of the selected program. The content recorder may then determine if the selected program view is the leading view of the selected program. When the selected view is not the leading view and the content recorder is configured for automatic view switching, the content recorder may autonomously switch to the leading view of the selected program. Alternatively, the content recorder may present vote totals of all views of the selected program and enable a selection of a desired alternate view.
As can be gathered, the above solutions enable recording of videos from different viewing angles and accordingly presenting any one viewing angle based on user selection. Thus, these solutions are focused on presenting a video recorded from one viewing angle at a time. However, these solutions do not provide any technique for viewing single immersive video, which has multiple angle information. Further, these solutions still present only one viewing angle at any time to the user. In addition, these solutions do not offer any preview of video at the selected viewing angle. Further, these solutions do not provide any mechanism to share video with preferred angle information.
Thus, there exists a need for a solution to overcome at least the above-mentioned deficiencies.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present disclosure. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present disclosure.